I would like to take a 75m hamstick, strip the wire and make a homemade bug catcher antenna. I would like for it to cover 20-10m. 40m and 6m would be a bonus. Does anybody have a coil that I could get? I am disabled and economically challenged. I am going on a road trip planned in a couple of weeks and would like to use my ft-817nd. Please email directly at pastor dot spaceboy at gmail dot com

Not a bug catcher but something you can make reasonably quickly and inexpensively. You're going to have a heck of a challenge working QRP HF mobile but on the higher bands with good conditions you might snag a few contacts.

Just how 'ugly' are you willing to go? That deals with the mechanical aspects mainly. Wind a coil on fairly large diameter PVC, or maybe a 2 liter pop bottle? Thread that onto a fiberglass whip that's something like 9 - 10 long and thread wire to the coil and above it. Ugly is a good name for that sort of thingy, but it'll work just dandy, especially at lower power levels, don't need as much coil turn spacing or as heavy a wire. With that sort of idea, the larger the coil the lower in frequency you can go without adding to the antenna's height. Tap that coil in the appropriate places and it should go from where ever to where ever.Good luck. - Paul

(Used a bug catcher for years and still have it. No, it isn't for sale. You can still get them by the way.)

If you go the home brew route perhaps a mechanically inclined neighbor/friend or member of local ham club (if any) could assist you with the on line construction methods. I often get assistance from the High school Vocational Ed. dept. students when putting up antennas or other building projects.

This is made from car copper brake pipe tubing on a 5" former, I stripped the wire from a hamstick, soldered the brake pipe to the top fitting, added thick gauge wire from the base of the coil to the base of the antenna and soldered it, As can be seen I use a tapped fly lead for band changing, I can get away with using the same shunt coil at the base of the antenna for 20/17/15m and bypass the shunt coil for 12/10m.

Here's the mk1 version where I used a crock clip fly lead for band changing and relied on hose clamps to secure the coil to the fibreglass shaft:

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